Peril at the Center of the Earth!
by Jeff Wikstrom
Summary: Dale and Foxglove discuss the semiotics of adventure comedy while doing heroic things.


THE ADVENTURES OF DALE AND FOXGLOVE: EPISODE SEVENTEEN: PERIL AT THE CENTER OF THE EARTH!  
  
Jeff Wikstrom  
  
  
One of the few things Dale ever regretted was not getting enough  
  
sleep. He liked sleep, loved sleep. He needed sleep. But every so  
  
often, and truth be told slightly more often recently, what with Foxy   
  
and her sleep schedule and all, although there had always been late-  
  
night television and marathons et cetera... every so often Dale didn't   
  
get all the sleep he needed. "No matter how much sleep you get, you   
  
can never get all the sleep." He'd said that once to Foxy (and she had   
  
laughed, which was the idea) and it was, after all, true. Take last   
  
night, for instance. Last night Dale had not gotten all the sleep he   
  
would have liked. At the time it had not seemed like a big deal... but   
  
back then, he hadn't known what he was going to be doing what he was   
  
doing now.  
  
At the moment he was clinging to the side of a deep shaft,   
  
hanging on for dear life, and hoping Foxy would be able to find a rope-  
  
or-something before his fingers went all numb and he fell to his death.  
  
Nonetheless, morale remains high, he thought to himself. It was   
  
just a bit of bad luck that kept them from returning home to the Tree   
  
and going to their beds filled with the knowledge that they had done a   
  
lot of Good and really made a nice, Rescue-Rangery kind of difference.  
  
He was worried about the index finger and thumb on his left hand.   
  
He used them more than most. They were always holding onto sandwiches   
  
or pencils or things, and they might get tired before the others. On   
  
the other hand, they were in better shape... "Any luck, Foxy?" he   
  
asked. He couldn't hear her answer, coming from wherever she was, but   
  
knew she could hear him, easily. "I'm kind of worried about this..."  
  
Really, he ought to be able to just climb up. It was the kind of  
  
thing he was expected to do, both as a Rescue Ranger and as a small  
  
gnawing-type mammal. He'd tried it, sure, but the bricks gave him no   
  
real purchase on the wall, and the crack in the mortar his hands were   
  
currently jammed into wasn't very big. As near as he could tell he   
  
wasn't in a very good position. But he trusted Foxy. She'd either   
  
find him a piece of rope-or-something, or cry for months and months   
  
about how much she had loved him and would miss him and all.  
  
Nonetheless, he reminded himself firmly, morale remains high.  
  
ROUGHLY EIGHT HOURS EARLIER  
  
"Now that," Dale said empathetically as, Foxy on his arm, he   
  
stepped out of the movie theater, "was a great movie!"  
  
Foxglove smiled. "What did you like best?" It was a question   
  
which she knew would keep him talking until they were back at the Tree.   
  
"I liked the secretary." It had started to rain after all while they   
  
were inside, so Dale opened the red-and-blue umbrella he'd borrowed   
  
from Gadget for the occasion.  
  
They'd just finished watching one of Dale's favorite films at the  
  
local Midnite Friday Film Fest, a double handful of blocks from the   
  
Tree. Foxglove, of course, could have flown back to the Tree in just a   
  
few minutes, but then she wouldn't have been with Dale. The shortest   
  
way back to the Tree was through a block of old commercial buildings,   
  
once small and independently-owned storefronts, now an upscale walking   
  
mall.  
  
"The secretary? She was just a little gag! The best part was   
  
Peter Sellers's speech at the end," Dale said authoritatively.  
  
"'Someday I'm going to make you Mrs. General What's-his-face...'"  
  
Foxglove smiled.  
  
"'Animals will be bred and slaughtered!!'" Dale crowed, twisting   
  
his voice into a vaguely German trill. "'Mein Fuehrer! I can walk!!'"  
  
"Well," Foxglove said thoughtfully, "I don't think I really like   
  
the idea of those poor animals being slaughtered -- Dale! I hear   
  
something!"  
  
Dale, who had been about to point out that the movie had ended   
  
with global thermonuclear holocaust, closed his mouth and stayed as   
  
quiet as he could while Foxglove closed her eyes and cocked her head,   
  
listening. He wondered what she heard, but didn't say anything. Her   
  
expression was slowly shifting from quizzical to extremely concerned.   
  
"There's a little boy, probably a mouse. He's that way," Foxy   
  
said, pointing a wing at one of the buildings which formed the alley  
  
down which they walked. "And he's crying. And there's another person,   
  
an older mouse I'm pretty sure, who is telling him to be quiet or he'll   
  
hit him again, and the little boy says he wants his mother and the   
  
older mouse says he'll never see his mother again and that his mother   
  
doesn't love him and that he has to go and work and not see his   
  
mother." Foxglove bit her lip and turned her wide eyes to Dale.   
  
"Uh..."  
  
Dale stood up straight, jutted his chin out and balled his hands   
  
into fists. "Let's go!"  
  
"Rescue Rangers, away!" Foxglove shouted excitedly. "They're   
  
over on the other side of this store. I'll fly over, and meet you   
  
there!"  
  
Dale nodded, and ran off.  
  
ABOUT A MINUTE LATER  
  
"I told you to quit crying, kid," the gruff mouse said. He was  
  
wearing a reddish pullover and a flat cap low over his eyes. His pulse   
  
rate indicated that he was agitated, presumably by the crying child.   
  
Angry, too. Foxglove's eyes narrowed.  
  
She was perched on the fire escape, well above the two mice,   
  
waiting for Dale to arrive so she could swoop down like a fiery angel   
  
of righteousness. Listening to them talk, she was rapidly piecing   
  
together the situation. Gruff-mouse had kidnapped boy-mouse and was   
  
taking him forcibly to some kind of hideous underground sweatshop,   
  
there to spend all his time making little wallets-or-something.  
  
"I don't wanna go!" The little boy, who Foxglove suspected was   
  
no more than eight on the outside (and probably closer to six) was   
  
extremely agitated, bawling, et cetera. Dale had better hurry.  
  
"Oh, good, there he is," Foxglove said out loud, and stepped off   
  
the fire escape.  
  
LESS THAN A SECOND LATER  
  
Dale turned the corner into the alley on all fours, the umbrella  
  
closed and between his teeth. He was running at top speed (which he   
  
hated doing, both on the grounds that it involved a great deal of   
  
physical exertion and that running on all fours made his butt stick   
  
out) so Foxy wouldn't have to endure watching the described scene very   
  
long. He kept close to the wall on one side, and arrived at the bit of   
  
ground under the fire escape just as Foxy fell out of the sky and   
  
landed on the larger mouse in a flurry and sweet-smelling heap.  
  
"Gotcha!" he said to the, as predicted, little mouse-child who   
  
had panicked and started running. Dale held him tightly and let the   
  
kid calm down while Foxy scared the living bejeezus out of the older   
  
mouse. Kid was soaking wet, but that was all right; the umbrella was   
  
closed.  
  
"Booga-booga! Booga-booga-boo!" Foxglove said in her most   
  
frightening voice, waving her wings in the mouse's face.  
  
"Okay okay okay I surrender I surrender!" he shouted. "Stop it   
  
stop it stop it please!"  
  
"You know," Foxy said conversationally as she helped the   
  
trembling mouse to his feet and confirmed he was undamaged, "bats eat   
  
insects, fruit, stuff like that. Not rodents."  
  
"Uh-huh," the mouse said numbly.  
  
"But that's beside the point," she added. "Now, how's about you   
  
tell me just what you and little... uh..."  
  
"Tibby, ma'm," little Tibby said.  
  
"Of course. You and little Tibby: what's up with that, huh?"   
  
Dale cried. "With the yelling and the, the..."  
  
"Meanness!" Foxglove interjected. "Meanness! In this day and   
  
age... it's a disgrace. I'm just having to wonder, now," she   
  
continued, looking up at him and shaking her head, "I just wonder what   
  
you really thought you were going to accomplish..."  
  
The gruff mouse, who still hadn't identified himself, swallowed   
  
back a rejoinder. Freebody considered his situation. One of his arms,   
  
and his tail, were shaking of their own accord. Clinging tightly to   
  
the chipmunk, little Tibby was staring at him with big, hurt-filled   
  
eyes. And a bat was glaring at him, lecturing him on the evils he was   
  
inflicting on the kid.  
  
An SC$800 bounty wasn't worth this. "Okay, then," Freebody said  
  
meekly. "I can see I've really gone wrong, fallen in with the wrong   
  
crowd --"  
  
"Are you being irreverent and... hiply ironic... at me?"   
  
Foxglove's eyes narrowed, and her voice assumed a tone both deeply   
  
wounded and deeply suspicious.  
  
"No, ma'am!"  
  
"Good. I hate hip irony." Foxglove heard Dale sigh inaudibly at   
  
this (he kind of liked hip irony and irreverence, though admittedly   
  
not when it was pointed at him) and quickly changed the subject. "What   
  
are you up to, huh, you... mean person, you?!"  
  
"Uh, well, then, uh..." Freebody thought desperately. He had to   
  
put a positive spin on this. "I'm, uh... sort of... in, uh,   
  
business..."  
  
"You kidnap children for money?" Foxglove asked him.  
  
"He what?!" Dale was so shaken he almost stopped comforting   
  
little Tibby.  
  
"I heard him, Dale." Foxglove's righteous anger was briefly   
  
displaced by a desire to explain herself to Dale and maybe impress him   
  
a little bit. "He was talking about how he was going to put the little   
  
boy --"  
  
"Tibby, ma'am."  
  
"...Put little Tibby in a factory floor sweatshop sort of   
  
thingy." Freebody chose this moment to make a run for it. His plans   
  
were foiled when Foxglove grabbed him by the collar and he eventually   
  
stopped.  
  
Dale scratched his head. This was a lot to take in. "Gee,   
  
that's pretty low, buddy."  
  
"Freebody," Freebody muttered. "My name is Freebody."  
  
"Freebody?" Dale couldn't let this one pass.  
  
"My brother's name is Venn and my sister's name is Vectorina,"  
  
Freebody spit.  
  
"Vectorina? Foxy, make a note. Some mice have weird names."  
  
Foxglove made a mental note, but didn't release Freebody. "What  
  
should we do, Dale?" She was glad the mouse was cooperating; Foxglove   
  
hated violence more than anything else in the world, even magic.  
  
"Well..."  
  
AROUND AN HOUR AND A HALF LATER  
  
Dale slapped himself in the forehead. "Oh, man..."  
  
"What? What's the matter?" Foxglove asked him.  
  
They were lying flat on their stomachs, on the roof of a small   
  
and rickety building someone had erected at the base of a storm drain.   
  
Water rushed all around the building, but it remained tight below the   
  
waterline. Light from streetlamps far, far overhead trickled down into   
  
the factory through skylights. It was through one of these skylights   
  
that the two Rescue Rangers peeked.  
  
Below them, in the factory, without any regard for proper   
  
bedtimes et cetera, a dozen small rodent-children (the usual mix of   
  
mouse, chipmunk, and squirrel) were silently stitching large men's   
  
wallets, several inches on a side. Five or six children were crowded   
  
around each wallet, in a textbook example of violation of OSHA   
  
regulations on workplace space and crowding. Three adult mice, ranging  
  
from tall-and-thin to tall-and-fat, watched over them with beady eyes.   
  
This was just the sort of thing the Rescue Rangers watched out for.   
  
Well, this and mad scientists with earth-shattering inventions which   
  
threatened the global balance of power. And overweight housepets who   
  
wanted gold and jewels for no particular reason. And Widget. They had  
  
to watch out for Widget...  
  
Dale had come up with what he was fairly sure was a reasonably   
  
clever plan. He would jump through one of the skylights, and rapidly   
  
the three mice would be on him. Then Foxy would fly down with a rope-  
  
or-something, and, with the three toughs distracted, tie them up no   
  
problem.  
  
He'd been forced to abandon that plan, however, when neither he   
  
nor Foxy had been able to find a rope-or-something. Plan B was a   
  
little riskier. He and Foxy would position themselves on either side   
  
of the front door of the factory, on the little walkway built out of   
  
Popsicle sticks. Then they would make some kind of racket (Dale hoped   
  
he could make a noise like a Freebody), and when the mice came up the   
  
short flight of stairs inside and out onto the wharf -- they would do   
  
this one at a time, hopefully -- they would hit them on the head with   
  
the umbrella and/or Popsicle sticks they'd pried loose.  
  
Something had been nagging him about this plan ever since he'd  
  
proposed it and Foxy had unquestioningly agreed. As they made their   
  
final preparations and started to psych themselves up, it hit him.  
  
Dale wasn't the Rescue Ranger who usually did things like this.  
  
Normally it was Monty.  
  
Then he realized what else had been bothering him. No Chip, no  
  
Gadget, no Monty, no Zipper. Just him and Foxy. And he was in charge.   
  
If Dale messed up, then Foxy would pay, too. And there wouldn't be   
  
anyone to bail them out. He could have gone back to the Tree with   
  
little Tibby, either woken everybody up or told them about it in the   
  
morning, and followed Freebody's directions and found the factory and   
  
raided it in force. Heck, he could have, instead of letting Freebody   
  
go with a stern warning, dragged him back to the Tree, there to spill   
  
his guts before the collected team.  
  
Could have, didn't. Dale made an executive decision. He turned   
  
to Foxy and smiled nervously. He didn't want her to know he'd messed   
  
up; he couldn't tell her they ought to turn around and go back.   
  
"Nothing, Foxy. Let's do this." Still, he wished Monty were there.  
  
Foxglove could hear that Dale was worried, both from his tone and   
  
from the flow of humours through his body. But, after all, there was   
  
plenty to be worried about, wasn't there? She had never done anything   
  
quite like this before; were she with any other Ranger, she would have   
  
suggested they radio for backup. (Although they didn't have a radio or   
  
a backup, exactly, she thought getting the rest of the team from the   
  
Tree about counted.)  
  
But, of course, Dale knew exactly what he was doing, so...   
  
"Right, sweetie."  
  
FIVE MINUTES LATER  
  
Dale wasted no time in dropping his makeshift umbrella-club and  
  
grabbing the stunned mouse. Tall-and-Thin Thug Number One, stunned as   
  
he was by the twin blows to the back of the head, proved no trouble in   
  
a quick rolling-him-off-the-wharf maneuver. Into the fast-moving water   
  
Tall-and-Thin Thug Number One was plunged, the splash drowned out by   
  
the noisy current.  
  
"I hope he wasn't hurt too bad," Foxy said as she dropped her  
  
Popsicle-stick onto the wharf and watched the thug. He was washed   
  
rapidly downstream, floating blissfully on his back while struggling   
  
uselessly against the current.  
  
"Ssh!" Dale made a shushing gesture, then pointed to the   
  
factory. According to Dale's Clever Plan for Rescuing the Children, the   
  
next thing that was supposed to happen was Tall-and-Fat Thug was   
  
supposed to come out looking for Tall-and-Thin Thug Number One, so they   
  
could bonk him over the head. This would leave only Tall-and-Thin Thug   
  
Number Two inside to deal with. Tall-and-Thin Thug Number One had   
  
closed the door behind him just before Dale and Foxglove had hit him,   
  
so the mice inside shouldn't know what had happened.  
  
Foxy hushed, and they waited for a bit.  
  
"I don't think he's coming out," she whispered.  
  
"What does it sound like?" Dale whispered back.  
  
Foxglove concentrated. The noise of the rushing water, just a   
  
short distance below, coupled as it was with the smooth, rounded walls   
  
of the storm drain, was making her hearing far less sensitive. But she   
  
could hear a dozen small bodies pressed up against the far wall of the   
  
factory. And one of the grown mice. She was pretty sure she couldn't   
  
hear the other one. It was hard to be certain.  
  
Dale's mind started racing when she relayed this information.   
  
What, he thought desperately, would Superman do? Something involving   
  
use of one of his many super-powers, probably. Batman was almost as   
  
bad. Robin. What would Robin do? If Robin were being assisted by,   
  
let's say, Flamebird. The Flamebird from "Titans West." Dale mentally   
  
reviewed everything he could remember about Robin and Flamebird and how   
  
they might behave in this kind of situation. Still, he wished Chip   
  
were there.  
  
"Okay," he muttered. "Foxy, fly up onto the roof and look down   
  
and see what they're doing, then come back here to me, okay?"  
  
"Gotcha." Foxglove nodded and silently flew up a foot, onto the   
  
roof of the factory.  
  
Dale watched her go, up and out of sight over the edge. Then   
  
someone tapped him on the shoulder.  
  
"Excuse me," someone behind him said.  
  
Dale sighed and screwed his eyes shut. He knew what was going to  
  
happen. He would turn, and then the mouse Foxy hadn't heard inside   
  
would punch him in the face. Dale would get punched in the face, and   
  
he would fall to the wooden flooring. Then the mouse would say some   
  
kind of quip, and Dale, stunned, would slowly rise to his feet. Then   
  
Foxy would rescue him.  
  
Dale had watched plenty of action comedies; he could spot a setup   
  
like this from a good long way off. So, instead of putting his head   
  
where the mouse's fist was going to go, the chipmunk ducked down   
  
towards where the mouse's stomach probably was, extended both arms   
  
outward, and squeezed what he felt as hard as he could.  
  
"Oof!" His attempt at genre convention ruined, Tall-and-Thin   
  
Thug Number Two doubled over, then fell down. Simultaneously, Dale   
  
rolled to the side, out of Number Two's area of fall. A swift kick,   
  
and Number Two joined Number One in the wash of rainwater. Dale   
  
watched him float away.  
  
Dale hummed a few bars of "Bad" under his breath as he rubbed his  
  
hands together excitedly, and looked around for Foxglove. No Foxglove.   
  
He looked around the wharf again.  
  
Still no Foxglove. He stepped back, so as to check the roof of   
  
the Popsicle-stick building. Nope.  
  
He checked the spot where he'd been standing a moment before. No  
  
good.  
  
Surely she hadn't snuck inside while he was distracted by the   
  
mouse trying to kill him. And she wouldn't have flown off without him.   
  
He'd need to think about this for a minute, and he was starting to get   
  
a headache.  
  
FIFTY-FIVE SECONDS LATER  
  
Foxglove's mind was going around in little tiny circles. She'd   
  
been up on the roof, watching what was happening down below, when she'd   
  
snapped. One of the little mouse-children was acting up, and the last   
  
thug -- who, she was a little relieved to hear, had a nice simple name,   
  
Lox -- had started slapping her around...  
  
Well, she'd burst through the skylight, and landed on Lox, and   
  
waved her wings at him and said booga-booga-booga, and... it hadn't   
  
worked. Lox knew all about bats, darn it. She'd frightened the kids,   
  
though. Darn it to heck, she thought, and chastised herself for strong   
  
language.  
  
She didn't know how to fight, and anyway she didn't really want   
  
to, so she quietly allowed Lox to overpower her and tie her up. She'd   
  
tried calling out to Dale, who was still 'outside,' but she didn't want   
  
to give away his position to her new hated enemy, Lox. So she'd called   
  
out with sonar, which he probably couldn't hear, but it was worth a   
  
shot.  
  
Lox brandished his knife, made from a sharpened sliver of   
  
aluminum off a soda can. "Stay quiet!" he hissed to Foxglove and the   
  
children, sounding kind of like Jack Nicholson. The door at the top of   
  
the stairs, which led out to the little pier, was slowly opening.  
  
  
Dale's headache got better as soon as Foxglove stopped emitting  
  
high-frequency sounds. He tried to decide what the cliche was for   
  
going into obvious danger: head first, backwards, what? He almost   
  
crawled in, but then he remembered he'd done that against Thug Number   
  
Two.  
  
Aw, heck. He strode confidently forward, chin held high, and   
  
fell down the stairs. He'd forgotten the floor inside was even with   
  
the bottom of the rainwater-river outside.  
  
"And check it out," Lox said to no one in particular. "It's   
  
Batgirl's boyfriend, come to make like a white knight and do a little   
  
rescuing." He kept the pointy end of the knife aimed at Dale's head.  
  
"Heh. You sound like Christian Slater," Dale said amiably,   
  
rubbing his head. "You okay, Foxy?" he asked when he saw her.  
  
Foxglove nodded, and shrugged helplessly. "I kind of jumped the   
  
gun," she said apologetically.  
  
"Aw, that's okay," Dale said, hoping to cheer her up. "I make  
  
mistakes like that all the time, honest."  
  
"Oh, Dale, that's sweet of you to say..."  
  
"Excuse me! Mouse with weapon here!" Lox advanced on Dale, who   
  
was now sitting cross-legged on the floor of the factory. "I'm in   
  
charge here!"  
  
"Oh, right, yeah. You want I should tie myself up?" Dale   
  
offered. He scanned the room, able to see things much more clearly   
  
down here than through the skylight above. Hmm. Skylight busted open.   
  
Only one room in the building, this one. The children were sitting   
  
fairly quietly against the far wall -- scared out of their wits,   
  
probably. Foxy was tied to a table with some thread. A stack of   
  
partially-completed wallets filled one corner. And there was a big   
  
mouse, wearing an orange bobble hat and sweatshirt, pointing a  
  
sharp bit of metal at him. On the whole, things could be worse.  
  
"Uh, yeah." Lox appeared to be trying to think. "Are you trying  
  
something?"  
  
"Naw, not really," Dale said sadly. "You've really got me at a   
  
real disadvantage, what with your little knife and me sitting down and   
  
Foxy tied up over there and all..."  
  
Foxglove frowned as she listened attentively. What Dale was   
  
saying and what the noises his body was making were saying weren't the   
  
same things. Dale was talking about how they didn't stand a chance, and   
  
his body was talking about how everything would be fine in half an   
  
hour. It was confusing, sort of like listening to Gadget or Widget and   
  
their bubbles.  
  
"Yeh," Lox said. "Don't you forget it, either!" He waved his   
  
knife around a little more.  
  
"So," Dale said as he glanced around. "Got any rope?"  
  
"Uh..." Lox bit his lip.   
  
"There's the thread over here, on me," Foxglove offered   
  
helpfully.  
  
"Hey, yeah. Or you could take apart one of the wallets," Dale   
  
pointed out. "One would make for enough thread, I betcha."  
  
"Shaddap!" Lox evidently didn't want to compromise the   
  
structural integrity of his wallets. Sweat beaded on his forehead as   
  
the thug tried to think. "Get over by the bat and untie her, then tie   
  
yourself and her up together."  
  
Dale shrugged. "If you say so." He rose and nonchalantly walked   
  
over to Foxglove. "Hey, uh, guy," he said over his shoulder as he   
  
examined the rope.  
  
"Yes?" Lox asked icily.  
  
"You really did a number on tying Foxy here up -- can I borrow   
  
the knife for a second? I don't think I can work these knots." Dale   
  
struggled to keep his voice even. Please, please, please...  
  
"But Dale," Foxglove protested, "if he gave you the knife then...   
  
oh! Oh! Oh!" She giggled excitedly, understanding what her handsome   
  
genius of a boyfriend was playing for.  
  
"Huh? Oh, yeah, sure. Hold on a second." Lox walked over to   
  
Dale and handed him the knife. "Here, see, you have to hold it right   
  
or it'll bite into your hand..."  
  
"You mean like this?" Dale brandished the knife. It was really   
  
cool, just like he'd hoped. "Oh, it's a horrible weapon." He thrust   
  
it at an imaginary foe. "'In the end,'" he intoned solemnly, "'there   
  
can be only one, or three at the absolute most.'" He winked at   
  
Foxglove, who giggled.  
  
"No, no," Lox interrupted. "It's not a sword -- you need to get   
  
your elbow into it. Like this." He stepped behind Dale, grasping his   
  
wrist like a tennis instructor.  
  
Life with Dale was an endless cavalcade of wonder, Foxglove   
  
mused. Here he was, distracting their enemy like a pro, absorbing all   
  
his attention, leaving her free to... uh... darn it, something.   
  
Something, something, something...  
  
"Psst!" she whispered to the nearest child, a little boy-  
  
chipmunk. He was watching Dale and Lox with rapt attention. "Psst!"   
  
she tried a little louder. He finally noticed her.  
  
"Yus?" he hissed as he leaned over to her.  
  
"What's your name? I'm Foxglove," she whispered. It was   
important to get off on the right foot.  
  
"Butch," he whispered.  
  
"Hi there, Butch, I'm pleased to meet you," she whispered, as   
  
friendly as she could be under the circumstances. "Can you bite   
  
through some of these knots tying me to this here table?"  
  
"Uh, m'kay," Butch said doubtfully. He stood up and walked   
  
slowly towards the table to which Foxglove was tied. "Where should I   
  
start?" he asked, scratching his head.  
  
"Anywhere!" Foxglove said, a little abruptly. "Just quickly,   
  
please!"  
  
"Well..."  
  
Butch had leaned over the big knot by Foxglove's left shoulder   
  
and was about to take a big bite out of it when Lox suddenly remembered   
  
to check on his prisoners and ended the impromptu lesson.  
  
"Hey! What kind of cleverness have we got going on here, huh?"   
  
he spat. "Sit back down, you little squirse!"  
  
"I'm not a squirse!" Butch said defiantly, but sat back down  
  
nonetheless.  
  
"Well, thanks for the lesson, anyway," Dale said. He sighed.  
  
"Yeh, sure. Now, let's see about getting you tied up..."  
  
TEN MINUTES LATER  
  
Lox and his two prisoners and his stable of child labor marched  
  
through the tunnel. It was dark, but Lox had a homemade-looking   
  
flashlight hat. In fact, he had three of them, and distributed the   
  
others to two of the children. They were marching in a line: first the   
  
children, then Foxglove, then Dale, with Lox bringing up the rear.   
  
Both Dale and Foxglove were tied up from the waist up, leaving their   
  
legs free for walking. Neither knew where they were going, but the   
  
children seemed to have a destination in mind, and Lox was making sure   
  
they followed along.  
  
"Did I ever tell you how the storm drains and pipes and stuff   
  
mess up my hearing?" Foxglove asked Dale.  
  
"Mmm..." Dale mulled this over. "Couple of times, yeah."  
  
"Well, it does."  
  
"Uh huh," Dale said absently. He was wondering why the children   
  
didn't try to rush Lox, in a madcap comic wacky scene like in a kid's   
  
movie.   
  
Foxglove misinterpreted his inattention as irritability. "Sorry.   
  
I just think it bears repeating." When Dale didn't respond, she added   
  
"Just trying to make conversation."  
  
"Huh? Sorry, what was that, Foxy?"  
  
"No talking!" Lox hissed.  
  
"Right, right, sorry." They marched along in silence for a   
  
while. Down a little slope, through a big empty tank, left at a   
  
fork...  
  
"Where are we going?"  
  
"No talking!"  
  
"Sorry, I forgot."  
  
Left at one fork, then right, then left again, then left...  
  
"Hey," Dale observed. "It's been raining all day. Why isn't   
  
this all flooded, like the channel with the factory?"  
  
"Hm? Oh, that's because of the... hey! No talking!" Lox shoved   
  
Dale from behind.  
  
"I'm sorry, I forgot again. Guess I just have a lot on my mind."  
  
"I think that's understandable, honey," Foxglove reassured him.   
  
"I mean, we're prisoners and we don't know where we're going and anyway   
  
it's all my fault..."  
  
"Aw, it's not your fault, Foxy! It's not."  
  
"Yes, it is," Foxglove insisted. "If I hadn't burst in we could   
  
have taken Lox down together, like we did Freebody, and..."  
  
"No, it's not your... Lox!" Dale turned around. "Tell Foxglove   
  
it's not her fault!"  
  
Lox was starting to get tired of these two. "Oh, all right.  
  
Foxglove, I was able to defeat you both not because of anything foolish   
  
either of you did, but because I am a superior being to you two   
  
losers."  
  
"Feel better, Foxy?" Dale asked hopefully.  
  
"A little," Foxglove sighed. "Can I have a hug?"  
  
"Fine, fine, if it'll shut you up. Hey! Thirty-second break!"   
  
Lox called to the children in front. After the procession ground to a   
  
halt, the thug stepped forward and gave Foxglove a quick hug.  
  
"Uh, thanks," Foxglove said when he finished. "But I kind of   
  
meant from, you know, Dale."  
  
"Oh." Lox cast his eyes down to the ground, a little embarrassed.   
  
"I should have guessed." The children suppressed giggles.  
  
"Hey, uh, could you help me out a bit here, with my armed being   
  
bound and all?" Dale asked.  
  
"Oh, right." Lox pulled out his little knife and cut Dale's   
  
bonds. "There you go."  
  
"Thanks." Dale gave Foxglove a warm hug.  
  
"Uh, Lox? Little help? I'd like to be able to hug Dale back..."  
  
"Sure, sure..." Lox sighed -- these two! -- and cut Foxglove's   
  
bonds as well. "Better?"  
  
"Much," Foxglove said as she melted into Dale's arms.  
  
"Ooooooh," said all the children in unison, until Lox made them   
  
quit.  
  
A few seconds later, Lox coughed politely. "Can we get going   
  
now?" he asked.  
  
"Right, right," Dale said, disengaging. "Let's go."  
  
As they started marching again, Lox couldn't shake the feeling   
  
that he had forgotten something, but couldn't think what.  
  
"That was very clever, Dale," Foxglove whispered.  
  
"What was?" Dale whispered innocently.  
  
Foxglove giggled.  
  
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, MORE OR LESS -- IT'S HARD TO JUDGE TIME DOWN IN   
THE STORM SEWERS  
  
Dale had one word. "Wow!"  
  
They had emerged from the tunnels to a large, vaulted chamber,  
  
possibly a disused pumping station or something like that, Dale didn't   
  
really know. He stopped at the entry-way and looked down into the   
  
room. At the bottom of a flight of stairs were indications of   
  
activity: a sort of ranch house and several outbuildings. They were   
  
all made from Popsicle sticks and caulk, like the "factory" above.   
  
Various pieces of junk lay strewn around the concrete floor, and a   
  
dozen candle-ends provided illumination.  
  
"Hey, keep moving," Lox ordered. He prodded Dale lightly with   
  
his knife, and the chipmunk raised his hands in the air and nodded.   
  
The children must have been here before, Foxglove observed; they  
  
scarcely paused when the room came into view, and started on down the   
  
stairs to the building.  
  
"So what's up with all this?" Foxglove asked as they followed.  
  
"I could have sworn I said something about no talking," Lox said  
  
meaningfully.  
  
"Aw, c'mon," Dale protested. "We've reached your incredible  
  
stronghold. Now you're supposed to fill us in on your incredible plan.   
  
Then you put us in some kind of elaborate deathtrap and head off to   
  
carry out your evil whims! Do the pre-reading, for heaven's sake!"  
  
"No, no, no," Lox said dismissively. "I'm the  
  
henchman-slash-trusted-lieutenant, not the mastermind," he pointed out  
  
(actually, he was exaggerating his position, but Lox figured they   
  
wouldn't know). "The boss will fill you in, I figure."  
  
"Boss? Aw, man..." Dale went over the list in his head.   
  
Definitely not Nimnul, of course; it wasn't his style. Fat Cat   
  
wouldn't have mice for henchmen, and besides he was out of town. Rat   
  
Capone, maybe? He hoped it was Rat Capone. He'd beaten Rat Capone   
  
before. "Is it Rat Capone?"  
  
"Who?" Lox asked blankly. "No, no, it's... well, you'll see."  
  
"Great," Dale muttered as the group approached the little house.   
  
He looked around for anything he could use to escape: there was a lot   
  
of Popsicle sticks (left over from construction?) and random bits of   
  
junk just laying around. If Gadget were around, she could have made   
  
some mecha or a hovercraft or something out of them in a handful of   
  
seconds, but she wasn't. He also counted five other adult mice, all   
  
big ones with leering smiles, lolling around.  
  
Foxglove could hear that Dale was worried. She smiled at him,   
  
hoping to signal her boundless optimism and total faith in him. He   
  
smiled back, but she could tell he was still upset.  
  
Once near the compound, Lox barked an order and the children   
  
hurried off to one of the outbuildings, which seemed to be their   
  
quarters. "Okay," he said to Dale and Foxglove. "Now you two get to   
  
meet the boss." He cackled evilly.  
  
"Okay," Foxglove said.  
  
"Looking forward to it," Dale agreed.  
  
Scowling, Lox led the duo into the largest building. The first   
  
room seemed to take about half the space available in the   
  
building, and was full of tables made from empty boxes of kitchen   
  
matches. There were also three more guards inside, Dale noticed, and   
  
also a heck of a lot of little pieces of jewelry, old coins, et   
  
cetera, heaped on the tables. Lots of Staten City dollars, too. It   
  
sure looked like a Rat Capone operation...  
  
"So where's the boss?" he asked impatiently. "The sooner he   
  
fills me in on his plan, then leaves me for dead, so I can rescue   
  
everyone and so on, the better."  
  
"Right in here," Lox said, shoving him through a doorway into   
  
another room.  
  
This room actually looked livable -- there were several chairs   
  
made from scraps of wood, a bit of carpeting, and Sugar Ray Lizard,   
  
looking very pleased with himself as he leafed through a Big Little   
  
Book.  
  
"Who are these two?" he asked Lox angrily. "They're too big to   
  
work!"  
  
"They attacked the wallet works, sir," Lox said meekly. "They   
  
got rid of Bela and Nat. I was barely able to capture them."  
  
"Sugar Ray! How are you doing?" Foxglove asked excitedly.  
  
The lizard shook his head. "And you are?"  
  
"Foxglove," she said, graciously forgiving him for forgetting her  
  
name. "And this is Dale."  
  
"Oh, yeah, I remember this one -- the cross-dressing, um,   
  
transvestite," Sugar Ray said as he set down his book.  
  
"Cross-dressing?" Foxglove turned to Dale, confused.  
  
"Not now, Foxy," Dale said with emphasis. "So, you're in charge  
  
here?" he asked Sugar Ray.  
  
"Yep," the anole said, smirking. "I worked under Rat Capone long  
  
enough to get the hang of criminal masterminding, and now I've struck   
  
out on my own."  
  
"Hey," Foxglove protested. "You promised Gadget you'd stay   
  
good!"  
  
Sugar Ray shrugged. "I guess I'm just a bad little boy."  
  
Lox cleared his throat.  
  
"Hm? Oh, yes, Rye, you can go."  
  
"Lox, sir," the thug said.  
  
"Whatever," Sugar Ray said dismissively and waved him away.   
  
"These two are professional do-gooders. They're too smart to try   
  
anything, here in my stronghold."  
  
"I wouldn't count on that," Foxglove said slyly.  
  
Dale tapped his foot, eager to move the plot along as quick as  
  
possible. "So what's your game, Sugar Ray? Recruiting an army of   
  
slaves, like your old boss?"  
  
"Oh, no," Sugar Ray said. "Feel free to have a seat, by the way,  
  
while I explain my plan."  
  
"Cool," Dale said, and sat down. Foxglove, slightly confused,   
  
sat next to him. Suddenly Dale slapped his forehead. "Shoot!"  
  
"What's the matter, honey?"  
  
"We should have gotten away from Lox after he untied us and   
  
forgot to tie us back up again!" Dale shook his head. "I feel so   
  
dumb," he muttered.  
  
"Aw, honey," Foxglove said. "It didn't even occur to me! I   
  
thought you were just trying to make us more comfortable..."  
  
"You know, Chip would have thought of that right away..."  
  
"Don't talk like that!"  
  
"Hello? Villain about to spill his guts? Over here?" Sugar Ray  
  
scowled at the two of them.  
  
"Right, right," Dale said. "I guess if we'd gotten away early,   
  
we wouldn't be following the script."  
  
"There you go," Foxglove said encouragingly.  
  
Sugar Ray cleared his throat and began. "After I escaped the  
  
employment of Rat Capone, I wandered the storm sewers aimlessly for a   
  
bit. Then I traveled cross-country as a roadie for a small band of   
  
bugs, who did covers of hits of the Sixties... they were too small to   
  
carry their instruments around, see. I was forced to leave my new job,   
  
though, when one bug got in a disagreement with the others and the band   
  
broke up and I ate one of them... well."  
  
Dale was a little disturbed to see Foxglove nod sympathetically.  
  
"So there I was, alone in Little Rock, without so much as two   
  
dead beetles to rub together. I decided then and there that I'd never   
  
take orders again, not from bugs, not from food, not from Rat Capone.   
  
I headed west, to Arizona -- I'm not allowed to talk about that -- but   
  
the upshot is I ended up back here, in New York, with three boxes of   
  
tongue depressors.   
  
"I used the techniques I'd seen so many times before to recruit a   
  
band of worthy followers, like Whassisname, Cream-cheese, who you met.   
  
We made a few deals, and now we're in the sweatshop business. We get   
  
raw materials, mostly leather and stuff, and we have them made into   
  
purses and wallets and things up above, so we don't need to move them   
  
all the way down here and back. They get sold on the street for cheap,   
  
and we convert the funds into durable goods, then into Staten dollars."  
  
Foxglove raised a wingtip. "How do you get them sold?" she   
  
asked.  
  
"That's a smart question, Foxglove," Sugar Ray said, sounding  
  
inordinately proud of himself. "I have a couple of humans on the   
  
payroll. I don't see them in person," he added quickly. "They get   
  
their orders over email. I use the computers at the public library, at   
  
night."  
  
"Clever," Dale admitted.  
  
"Yep. Of course, I use slave labor to keep costs down. Children   
  
work best, because they're easily intimidated... been taking orders all   
  
their lives, right? There was a little trouble at first, but we beat   
  
'em into line." Sugar Ray leaned back and grinned.  
  
"Aren't you a little worried about, you know, being incredibly  
  
horribly terribly just way too much for words evil and all?" Foxglove   
  
asked.  
  
"Nah. I'm more worried about attracting Sewer Al's attention.  
  
Considers the whole underground property, after all; probably think I'm  
  
trespassing. Sewer Al frightens me. But I've been lucky so far. Do   
  
you have any more questions?"   
  
"I don't think so, no," Dale said. Foxglove shook her head. "So   
  
what now?"  
  
"Well..."  
  
"I was thinking tying us up in a storm pipe that doesn't have any   
  
flow right now. Then when the rainwater comes through, we'd drown,"   
  
Dale suggested.  
  
"Hmm... a good old-fashioned deathtrap. Sounds good to me,"   
  
Sugar Ray said. "Let's get to it."  
  
TWO HOURS LATER  
  
Things were definitely moving ahead, Dale thought as he stared up   
  
at the inside of the pipe. Now he just had to escape, make his way   
  
back to the compound, free the slave-children, and get back to the tree   
  
for breakfast. Piece of cake.  
  
  
"Dale?" Foxglove asked behind him. They were tied back-to-back,   
  
in sitting positions, so she couldn't see his face. She could hear the   
  
blood coursing through his veins, of course, but that wasn't quite the   
  
same. "What now?"  
  
"Uh, give me a second to think," Dale said. "Have we got   
  
something to cut the string with? I should have brought that spy   
  
equipment suit thingy I made. It had a little cutting blade on it...   
  
oh, well."  
  
"There's your teeth," Foxglove suggested.  
  
"Hmm... no good; I can't reach anything with my mouth. I wonder   
  
if they did that on purpose or if it's just bad luck," he mused.   
  
"Maybe it's because I've used that trick before too many times."  
  
"Not lately," Foxglove pointed out. "I mean, I tried to get   
  
little Butch --"  
  
"Who?"  
  
"One of the children at the wallet-place. A chipmunk. I tried   
  
to get him to eat my bonds, but it didn't work out."  
  
"Hmm. It's probably just bad luck." Dale sighed. "So, what   
  
else can we use?"  
  
They both looked around. The interior of the pipe was smooth,   
  
with no sharp edges for cutting. There weren't any pieces of glass or   
  
anything, either. And it was dark, almost too dark to see, though a   
  
little indirect light was coming from nowhere in particular.  
  
There was a long pause. Dale wished he had a utility belt.  
  
"Wait a minute," he said. "Did they remember to tie us up from  
  
the waist down after they walked us in here?"  
  
"Hey, no, they didn't!" Foxglove replied excitedly.  
  
"Then we can just stand up and walk out!"  
  
"Right!"  
  
"On three... one... two... three!" They both began to struggle.  
  
Nothing happened.  
  
"Hmm," Dale said after a few seconds.  
  
"Maybe if we push against each other with our backs?" Foxglove  
  
suggested.  
  
That didn't work, either.  
  
"Darn it," Dale said. "It seemed like a good idea."  
  
Foxglove almost nodded sadly, then remembered Dale couldn't see   
  
her, so she sighed mournfully instead.  
  
"Oh!" she said, struck with a thought. "Maybe we can scoot along   
  
the bottom of the pipe!"  
  
"Hey, that's an idea," Dale said. "Here, you're lighter than I   
  
am, so let's twist around so that you're facing the direction of the   
  
compound. Then you lift your legs up, and I'll push us along with my   
  
legs. You'll have to steer."  
  
They began to struggle, twisting in the same direction.  
  
"No, no," Dale said. "You go left, and I go right."  
  
"Whose left?"  
  
"Oh, never mind. Just... yes... like that. Good. Here we go."  
  
At last they were able to begin moving.  
  
"Oh, how clever!" Foxglove said. It was kind of fun, sliding   
  
along on her bottom. "A little bit to the left, Dale. My left.   
  
Your... right."  
  
"Uff," Dale grunted. It was hard work.  
  
"I hope we can find something with a sharp edge to cut the   
  
string," Foxglove added.  
  
"Me... umph... too..."  
  
TEN MINUTES LATER  
  
"I'm... about... ready... to take a... break... Foxy," Dale said,  
  
panting.  
  
"Okay," Foxglove said. They slid to a stop.  
  
Dale sighed contentedly, glad to be in a magic land of no-  
  
scooting-along-ground-with-legs, however briefly.  
  
"I'd get you a drink of water, or a pillow, or, you know,   
  
something like that," Foxglove said over her shoulder. "But I'm tied   
  
up."  
  
"That's okay, Foxy," Dale said.  
  
"Your heart rate is going down nicely," she offered after a   
  
pause. "Comfy?"  
  
"Sure."  
  
"I bet it goes back up, though," Foxglove said sadly. "I'm   
  
sorry."  
  
"It's not your fault," Dale said automatically. "Why do you   
  
think it's about to go back up?"  
  
"Because I'm going to have to tell you about the roaring,   
  
rushing, water-splashing kind of noise coming from up-pipe." She   
  
sighed again.  
  
"Oh, dear." He could hear it too, now. "What kind of noise   
  
would you call that?"  
  
"It's the sound of an overflow pipe getting filled and sending  
  
rainwater further down towards the, what's the word, exhaust?   
  
Exhaust," Foxglove said authoritatively.   
  
"Oh, here it comes," he said gloomily. "I can see it."  
  
"Where? Oh, right, behind me..." She braced for impact. It   
  
didn't sound bad, yet.  
  
"It's just a trickle," Dale said. "Ooh, chilly. Feel that?"  
  
"Uh-huh. I guess it'll get worse pretty soon."  
  
"Yeah... hey, Foxy? How buoyant are you? Maybe we can float   
  
along."  
  
"What if we tumbled over, and one of us was on top and one of us   
  
was on bottom and the one that was on bottom couldn't breathe and the   
  
one that was on the top tried and tried but couldn't get air to the   
  
one on bottom and the one on bottom drowned?"  
  
"Well," Dale admitted, "that would be bad."  
  
"It's getting louder," Foxglove observed. "We'd better do   
  
whatever quickly."  
  
"Yeah -- here, let's start scooting again," Dale said. "Lift   
  
those legs..."  
  
Foxglove couldn't resist crying 'whee!' as they slid down the   
  
tunnel. The wet pipe was slick, and the water was fast-moving. They   
  
were starting to pick up speed, skimming along.  
  
"This isn't going to end well," Dale muttered as he kicked them   
  
along.  
  
"Why not?" Foxglove asked over her shoulder. "We're really   
  
making much better time, now."  
  
"It's been a really long stretch since the last action sequence   
  
or plot development," Dale explained. He'd forgotten Foxy could hear   
  
him mutter.  
  
"I think you're taking the whole drama thing too seriously,"   
  
Foxglove protested. "Oh! Quick quick quick right! Right! Your   
  
right! Right now!"  
  
"Gotcha." Dale banked hard to the right, and saw a nasty-looking  
  
clump of sewer ooze or something slide past to his left. "I'm telling   
  
you, it's worked so far," he continued. "Something bad is going to   
  
happen, any second now."  
  
"You're such a mister frowny face," Foxglove chided, and giggled.  
  
"Left!"  
  
Dale steered around another patch of muck. "Are we getting   
  
anywhere?" he asked.  
  
"Sure, we... uh-oh," Foxglove trailed off, and Dale could feel   
  
her shoulder muscles tensing up. "Uh, up? Over? Backwards?"  
  
"Foxy?"  
  
"Ooh, now we're in trouble. Brace for impact!"  
  
"What?"  
  
Suddenly the pair plowed into a mess of debris partially blocking   
  
the pipe: twigs, Styrofoam cups, part of an old issue of Cosmopolitan,   
  
all melded together into a loose conglomerate of trash which allowed   
  
water through but blocked rodents. It wasn't actually at all that   
  
painful; the massed junk flexed slightly and assimilated them into the   
  
collective, adding their uniqueness to its own. Dale ended up in a   
  
relatively high place, up near a round plastic lid that had once kept   
  
coffee from spilling out of the cup.  
  
"You okay, Foxy?" he asked over his shoulder.  
  
"Sure! Hey! Look!"  
  
"I can't see anything but the top of the pipe, Foxy."  
  
"Oh, sorry. There's a broken aluminum can, right by me! We can   
  
cut ourselves free with it!" Foxglove was pelted with a number of   
  
conflicting emotions. Pleased, because they had to get untied-together   
  
to save the children. Disappointed, because she kind of enjoyed the   
  
closeness only being tied together could bring to a relationship. And   
  
embarrassed, because she hadn't detected the can before with her   
  
echolocation.  
  
Whoops, Dale was talking. "How can we get down to it?" he asked.  
  
"We're kind of stuck up here."  
  
"Um... the water level is rising, too."  
  
FORTY-FIVE MINUTES OF HARD WORK LATER  
  
"Man, that tired me out," Dale said. "Let's take a break." He  
  
stretched and tried to think of something funny about being tied to   
  
Foxglove and risking drowning. He came up with a dozen different   
  
lines, but none of them seemed very good; he was very tired indeed. "I   
  
think we're pretty near the compound," he added. "Hear anything?"  
  
They were in an innocuous stretch of pipe, a short stretch from   
  
the morass of material which had freed them, otherwise just like the   
  
hundreds of other lengths of pipe in the system. It was very dark; the   
  
only light came from those same vague, indirect sources he'd noticed   
  
before. There wasn't any water in this pipe, which was a plus.   
  
Something about the way the dull metal shone seemed familiar, however,   
  
and Dale believed they had been marched through here before, when Sugar   
  
Ray Lizard was sending them to a watery grave.  
  
"Mmm, no," Foxglove said after cocking her head for a second.   
  
"It's probably me, though."  
  
"Well, let's come up with a plan of attack," Dale said. It was   
  
what the other Rangers would want to do.  
  
"Okay... um, how?" This was outside Foxglove's range of   
  
experience.  
  
"Uh, I don't really know... we need to get the children out,   
  
right? But there's probably a bunch of them. I got the impression   
  
that there was more than just the one workshop, and there were a dozen   
  
kids working in that one. So there's going to be a lot of kids to   
  
move, and it'll be real... uh, what's the word..."  
  
"Hard? Tough? Confusing? Chaotic?"  
  
"Chaotic, that's it. So we definitely won't want any of Sugar   
  
Ray's mice, bothering us. Or Sugar Ray, for that matter. I don't mean   
  
we don't want them bothering Sugar Ray..."  
  
"I understand," Foxglove said, nodding.  
  
"I mean we don't want them OR Sugar Ray bothering us. Okay.   
  
That means we have to contain the whole bunch of them."  
  
"No fighting," Foxglove said. "I know you could take them all   
  
down if you needed to, of course," she added, "but I don't think   
  
violence is good."  
  
"Right," Dale agreed quickly. "I wish Gadget were here," he said  
  
after a moment's consideration. "She's good at coming up with   
  
distractions."  
  
"Well, what does she do? Let's do that," Foxglove suggested.  
  
"Aw, we can't built a killer robot from Popsicle sticks," he   
  
protested. "We aren't touched."  
  
"Oh, yeah," she said. "Shoot."  
  
"All right," Dale said as he began pacing. "What would Batman do   
  
in this situation?"  
  
"I don't know," offered Foxglove.  
  
"Hm? Don't worry, Foxy; I'm talking to myself." Dale wiped his   
  
damp brow. "Uh, maybe he would set up some kind of strange noise in   
  
some side tunnel or something. Then all the thugs would go check it   
  
out..."  
  
"And we could trap them in there?" Foxglove asked.  
  
"Right!" Dale grinned. Coming up with a plan wasn't that hard   
  
after all.  
  
Foxglove closed her eyes and tried to visualize it. "Wait a   
  
second, honey. How can we be sure that they'd all go down the tunnel   
  
together? Wouldn't they just send one or two?"  
  
"Gee, I don't know. You think?" Dale asked uncertainly.  
  
"Wouldn't you?" Foxglove replied. "But it's a good way to get   
  
rid of one or two of them," she added encouragingly.  
  
"Yeah, yeah. Batman would sneak in and scare Sugar Ray Lizard   
  
into giving up," Dale mused. "He's not scared of us, though... Okay,   
  
who else is smart?"  
  
"Gadget and Widget and Chip and you are all smart," Foxglove   
  
pointed out.  
  
Dale cleared his throat and mulled this over. "Gadget would   
  
build something out of rubber bands and Popsicle sticks... there's no   
  
way we can duplicate that," he said firmly. "Widget would... hm, I   
  
guess, IF Widget wanted to rescue the children, which is kind of a big   
  
leap right there, she would assemble a commando team and fight her way   
  
in to Sugar Ray Lizard, then violently intimidate him into surrendering   
  
to her."  
  
"Oh, ick," Foxglove muttered.  
  
Dale nodded, although he thought it would be fun to watch, but   
  
not participate in. "Chip would... he would... he'd probably go get   
  
some help. Which we can't do, because that would --"  
  
"Violate troap," Foxglove agreed. "So you said."  
  
"'Trope,' Foxy. It's the set of conventions to which a story   
  
element must adhere, if it can be considered part of a genre... oh,   
  
well, anyway. What else have we got?"  
  
"Who else is smart?" Foxglove asked rhetorically. They both   
  
thought about this for a while.  
  
"Jeeves!" Dale cried. "Jeeves," he repeated. "Jeeves would do  
  
something based on the psychology of the individual."  
  
Foxglove shook her head blankly. "Who's Jeeves?" she asked.  
  
"What do we know about Sugar Ray Lizard?" Dale asked her. "He   
  
used to work for Rat Capone. He's greedy and lazy and not very bright.   
  
He's afraid of Sewer Al." He ticked these points off on his fingers,   
  
one by one.  
  
Foxglove nodded.  
  
"So, what does that tell us about his surprisingly clever leather   
  
goods racket? There must be some kind of problem with it, something   
  
that he -- as a foolish anole -- didn't take into consideration," Dale   
  
said decisively. "Stands to reason, right?"  
  
"Sure!" she agreed eagerly.  
  
"That's the psychology of the individual," he concluded with a  
  
confident grin.  
  
Foxglove beamed at him. He was so smart! "So how do we use that   
  
to save the kids?" she asked.  
  
Dale was a little taken aback. He hadn't really thought that far  
  
ahead. "Uh, well, we'll need to do a little recon. Maybe ask around,   
  
do a little research, you know, stuff like that."  
  
"I can go scout ahead," Foxglove said. "I mean," she added,   
  
"it's dark and hard to see and I can hear really well, although to be   
  
fair only if the pipes open up a little."  
  
"I guess that's the best option," Dale said reluctantly. "I'll   
  
wait here and think. Don't try and do anything risky," he cautioned.   
  
"You might get hurt or spotted or lost or something... huh, I sound   
  
like Chip, don't I?" Dale snickered to himself.  
  
"I'll be careful," Foxglove promised. "I'll just move ahead to   
  
where I can hear what's going on in the compound, and maybe hear   
  
something we can use to free the kids."  
  
They hugged briefly, and then Dale was alone in the pipes below   
  
the city. He began to pace back and forth, trying to remember some   
  
kind of 007ish super-spy stunt which would be applicable in this   
  
situation.  
  
ELEVEN MINUTES LATER, or ABOUT TWO HOURS AND FORTY-FIVE MINUTES BEFORE   
DALE IS CLINGING FOR HIS LIFE TO THE SIDE OF A DEEP HOLE  
  
Foxglove, Champion of the Oppressed and Beloved of All Nice   
  
People Everywhere, Consort to a King among Chipmunks, strode cautiously   
  
down the pipe. She listened intently, her preternaturally keen ears   
  
scanning, scanning, scanning for any hint of activity. Nothing...   
  
nothing... something? Something. She froze in her tracks.  
  
"Bela! Bela! Where the heck have you been, man?" The speaker   
  
was a mouse, female, habitually insincere. "You look like a wet hen,   
  
so to speak."  
  
"Hey, hey, freezing, hey, hey," answered another mouse. The   
  
voices were badly muffled, echoing down the pipes from several feet or   
  
yards away. Foxglove doubted the other mouse, the male Bela who was   
  
all cold and wet, had actually said "hey hey" like that, but that's   
  
what it had sounded like.  
  
"What happened?" asked the female as they started moving.   
  
Foxglove started walking too, trying to keep them in range without   
  
getting close enough that they could hear her. Since she wasn't sure   
  
which way they were going, it wasn't easy.  
  
"Hey hey hey hey Sewer Al hey hey hey," explained Bela. Well,   
  
probably not, but that was what Foxglove heard. Darn it, they were   
  
moving out of range! She decided she must have been walking the wrong   
  
direction and doubled back.  
  
"Sewer Al? You mean... Sewer Al is on to us? Sewer Al has a   
  
grudge against us? Sewer Al wants to take us out, and not to dinner,   
  
so to speak?" The female mouse, whom Foxglove had mentally labeled   
  
Francine for no very good reason, sounded frightened and highly   
  
agitated. Maybe. Francine was louder than Bela, which helped.  
  
Foxglove couldn't hear Bela's reply at all, but it didn't matter.   
  
Francine's case of the nerves had given her an idea. It was a   
  
brilliant idea: an idea capable of lighting the darkness between her   
  
and Dale and her and Dale's goal of rescuing the children. She spun   
  
around and hurried back to her partner in heroism.  
  
NEARLY SIMULTANEOUSLY  
  
Dale gave up pacing after a bit and just sat there, on the bottom   
  
of the pipe. "Okay," he said out loud. "Psychology of the individual.   
  
Something about Sugar Ray Lizard. I'm Sugar Ray Lizard," he tried.   
  
"I'm mean and green and not real clever. I used to work for Rat   
  
Capone. I'm afraid of Sewer Al. I have a lot of mice and rats and   
  
people like that working for me..."  
  
He leaned back, too far, and fell on his back against the curved   
  
bottom of the pipe. "Mean... green... not clever... worked for Rat   
  
Capone... afraid of Sewer Al... people work for me... mean... green...   
  
not clever... worked for Rat Capone... afraid of Sewer Al... people   
  
work for me..." he chanted, his eyes screwed shut.  
  
"I'm afraid of Sewer Al..."  
  
Deep within the bowels of Dale's brain, two neurons struggled out   
  
of their lethargy. The dendrites of the one cell slowly twisted around   
  
to line up with the axon of the other, forming a synapse.   
  
Macromolecular engines, mostly protein enzymes, caused the properties   
  
of the cellular membranes changed slightly, and potassium and sodium   
  
cations flooded out of the first cell and into the second, minutely   
  
changing the electrochemical makeup of the local tissue. A tiny spark   
  
of potential leaped from one neuron to the other: the synapse fired.  
  
"Of course!" Dale rose to his feet and hopped up and down,   
  
excited by the brilliance of his new plan. "Sugar Ray is scared like   
  
to death of Sewer Al! If we pretend that we aren't Dale and Foxglove,   
  
but rather other people, he'll fear us! We'll be clever and quick,   
  
sneaky and smart, and we'll get Sugar Ray to do what we want him to do   
  
without him knowing that it's us who want him to do what we want him to   
  
do, he'll think it's Sewer Al doing the controlling! You see, Foxy?"   
  
Dale asked as she appeared from around a bend in the pipe.  
  
"Yes, what?" Foxglove had been turning her clever notion over and   
  
over in her mind. Sugar Ray was afraid of Sewer Al. Dale could make a   
  
Sewer Allesque voice, and she could probably feed him enough   
  
information using echolocation to make a credible go of it...   
  
Distracted by all these thoughts, though, she hadn't listened to a word   
  
Dale had said. Instantly she knew she had to convey her clever plan to   
  
him.  
  
"We can pretend to be Sewer Al!" they exclaimed in unison.  
  
"Yes, exactly!" they agreed, in unison.  
  
"Why are you repeating everything I say?" they asked each other,   
  
in unison.  
  
"Why are you repeating what I say?" they responded, in unison.  
  
"I'm not!" they said, reproachfully and in unison.  
  
"Well, I'm not!" they quickly responded, in unison.  
  
"What?" they asked in unison... you get the idea.  
  
"What?"   
  
"Stop this!"  
  
"I can't!"  
  
"All right, we'll do it on the count of three!"  
  
"On three, or do we stop on three?"  
  
"One!"  
  
"Two!"  
  
"Three!"  
  
"Now we stop!"  
  
"So stop already!"  
  
"I did stop, you're still doing it!"  
  
"Am not!"  
  
"Are too!"  
  
"Am not!"   
  
"Wha--" Foxglove gripped her head, screamed in such a manner that   
  
no one could hear her, and winced. This was seriously messing her up.   
  
"Dale!"  
  
Dale blinked twice, then closed his mouth. His head was spinning   
  
like a top. "What just happened?" he asked slowly. "Did I just blow   
  
my own mind? Is my head spinning like a top?"  
  
"I had an idea..." Foxglove began.  
  
"Never, ever, have an idea again, Foxy. I mean that," Dale said   
  
as he slumped down into a sitting position and began taking an   
  
inventory of which parts of his brain were hurting.  
  
"No, you silly," Foxglove said affectionately. "I had an idea   
  
and *then* the world stopped making any kind of sense."  
  
"I had an idea, too..." Dale considered. "Foxy, what was your   
  
idea?"  
  
Foxglove bit her lip. She didn't want to make Dale feel bad if   
  
her idea was better, and at the same time she didn't want to look too   
  
bad if her idea wasn't as good as Dale's. "You first," she said.  
  
Dale scowled to himself. Foxy could be so insecure, and he   
  
didn't want her to be hurt if his idea was much better than hers. But   
  
on the other hand, he was a Rescue Ranger and professional hero, and   
  
she was just apprenticing. "No, I want to hear yours," he said   
  
carefully.  
  
Foxglove considered, then sighed. "I thought we could pretend to   
  
be Sewer Al," she said. "Sugar Ray Lizard and all his cronies are all   
  
afraidy of Sewer Al, and I don't think they've ever met, so all you'd   
  
have to do is use a fake Sewer Al-type voice and speak from the   
  
shadows."  
  
"That was my idea! You stole my idea!" Dale leaped to his feet   
  
and pointed accusingly.  
  
Foxglove's jaw dropped. "I did no such thing!" she huffed, then   
  
crossed her arms and turned her back to Dale. "I don't know how you   
  
could possibly think that," she said over her shoulder. "I bet you   
  
didn't even have an idea! You just said it was your idea to cover up!"  
  
"I did too! It's a good idea, and I had it first!" Dale snapped.   
  
"I bet you read my mind with your ears and got it that way!"  
  
"Did not!" Foxglove couldn't deduce actual ideas from the noises   
  
people's brains made, just their general emotional state. "I can't do   
  
that, anyway. I heard one of the thugs we put in the stream get found   
  
by a different thug, and they were talking about it and it gave me the   
  
idea. So there!" She turned her head so Dale could see, and stuck out   
  
her tongue at him.  
  
"Oh, you did?" Dale asked weakly. "I was pacing around and I was   
  
thinking about the psychology of the individual some more, and how   
  
Sugar Ray Lizard kept saying he was afraid of Sewer Al and I thought of   
  
it then."  
  
"Oh, you did?" Foxglove asked in much the same tone.  
  
"Yeah, but it's not important," Dale said quickly. "I'm sorry,   
  
Foxy, I didn't mean to make you mad --"  
  
"I'm sorry, too, Dale!" Foxglove cried dramatically. She spun   
  
around, with much theatrical flair, and wrapped her wings around her   
  
chipmunk, showering him with kisses.  
  
Foxglove hated to fight. But she liked to make up.  
  
QUITE A WHILE LATER -- TIME AT HOLE MINUS FIFTEEN MINUTES  
  
"All right," Dale whispered. "Here's what we do."  
  
They were in what Dale figured was the perfect spot. It was a   
  
cranny on the edge of Sugar Ray Lizard's compound, a little bracket not   
  
far from the main building, but also very near a wide and exceptionally   
  
dark side tunnel. The only downside was that they couldn't actually   
  
see the large chamber from where they hid.  
  
"I'll stay here, and you stay here," he continued, "and we wait   
  
for one of the thugs to come within earshot. Then I'll start talking   
  
in my Sewer Al voice, and you feed me any information you pick up with   
  
your ears."  
  
"Right!" Foxglove whispered excitedly. "Ooh, ooh, I hear someone   
  
coming!"  
  
"What's he look like?"  
  
Foxglove screwed her eyes shut and listened intently. "Oh, I've   
  
heard her before! It's Francine. She's a mouse. She's not very   
  
nice," she added after a moment.  
  
"FRANciNE," Dale said, in an almost-but-not-quite perfect   
  
imitation of Sewer Al's majestic intonations. He'd spent about an hour   
  
practicing; any more and he'd be hoarse. (Hoarse, not alligator, he   
  
thought to himself. Shame he didn't have anything he could stick that   
  
pun on...)  
  
Out in the open, the mouse, whose name was actually Linda (after   
  
the woman on "Sesame Street"), froze. The darkness was talking to her.  
  
"FranCINE," Dale tried again.  
  
With an "eep!" Linda surrendered to instinct, and curled up in a   
  
little ball so as to resemble a brownish inanimate object, such as a   
  
furry stick or a very overripe ham sandwich. She didn't know what was   
  
going on but it was scaring her breathless.  
  
"It's not working," Dale whispered to Foxglove.  
  
"No, no, she's really frightened," Foxglove reassured him. "Try   
  
again."  
  
"FRANCINE. THIS is SEWER AL. ANSWer ME."  
  
There was a long silence. Linda pulled her head out of her navel   
  
long enough to make sure that yes, she was the only person around.  
  
"...do you mean me?" she finally asked.  
  
"YES," Sewer Al answered with a slight edge of exasperation.   
  
"WHAT toOK YOU SO LOng?"  
  
"My name isn't Linda," Linda said meekly. "I mean, my name isn't   
  
Francine. It's Linda."  
  
There was another long, pregnant, silence.  
  
"I KNEW THAT," Sewer Al eventually responded. "FETCH me SUGAR   
  
RAY LIZARD. I WILL HAVE WORDS WITH HIM."  
  
"Yessir. I mean, Yesma'am. I mean --" Linda shuddered and ran   
  
in the direction of the compound at top speed.  
  
  
"What made you think her name was Francine?" Dale hissed.  
  
"Well, I... I don't know, come to think of it," Foxglove said   
  
thoughtfully. "She was just a voice, so I kind of, assigned her a   
  
name."  
  
"Why Francine?"  
  
"Well, I... I don't know that, either."  
  
  
JUST ABOUT THE SAME TIME, BUT QUITE A WAYS AWAY... UNDER THE LIONS  
  
Radio on, static and improbable transmission.  
  
"'What? Sewer Al here? Sewer Al has come at last?!'"  
  
One eyebrow, above a glowing eye, perks up.  
  
"'That's what he.. she... it... said!! Al is here and wants to   
  
talk to you!! We're up the creek without a paddle, so to speak!!'"  
  
"'This can't be good...'"  
  
Radio off, silence and tranquility once more under the Lions.  
  
Heated discussion, plans formed, argument and disagreement.   
  
Resolution reached, Hands summoned. Hands briefed. Hands dispatched.  
  
  
BACK AT THE COMPOUND, A COUPLE OF MINUTES LATER  
  
"SUGar RAY LIZARD," Dale said as powerfully as he could. "I HAVE   
  
WORDS for YOU."  
  
"Hello, Sewer Al, uhm, your eminence." Sugar Ray wiped his brow;   
  
he was sweating bullets. Funny, that. He didn't think he had sweat   
  
glands.  
  
"Are they buying it?" Dale hushily asked Foxglove beside him.  
  
"I think so," she replied with equal hushiness.  
  
"How many?"  
  
"Sugar Ray and Fran... Linda," she corrected herself. "And Lox   
  
and another one I don't know who is."  
  
"SEND THEM AWAY, SUGAR RAY," Dale ordered. "ALL of THEM -- LOX   
  
AND LINDA AND EVERYONE."  
  
"Right away, your grace!" Sugar Ray took three involuntary steps   
  
backwards. He turned to the spot where his henchthings had been   
  
standing, eager to pass on Sewer Al's order, and saw they had already   
  
skeddadled.  
  
"Done, your excellence."  
  
"OKAY, well, uh, I'VE BEEN PAYING ATTENTION TO YOUR LITTLE   
  
PROJECT HERE, SUGAR RAY, AND I DON'T PARTICULARLY LIKE WHAT I SEE. NO   
  
SIR, NOT ONE LITTLE BIT. NUH-UH."  
  
There was a pause. Sugar Ray wondered whether that was good or   
  
bad.  
  
"I WANT YOU TO SHUT IT DOWN, SUGAR RAY. SHUT IT DOWN AND RETURN   
  
THE CHILDREN. IF YOU DON'T YOU'LL REGRET IT."  
  
"You aren't going to eat me, are you?" Sugar Ray asked meekly.  
  
"No no no, OF COURSE NOT. I WOULDN'T DREAM OF IT. BUT IF YOU   
  
DON'T CLOSE EVERYTHING DOWN I'LL FLOOD THIS SECTION OF MY SEWERS AND   
  
YOU KNOW I MEAN IT, suGAR RAY, BECauSE YOU REMEMBER WHAT I DID TO RAT   
  
CAPoNE!"  
  
Sugar Ray did in fact remember what had happened to Rat Capone,   
  
until Capone had surrendered and accepted Sewer Al's dominion over him.   
  
He shuddered at the thought. "So you want a cut?" He'd expected it   
  
would come to this eventually.  
  
"HEck NO. I WANT *cough* YOU SHUT DOWN, SUGAR RAY. I want THE   
  
KIDS PUT BACK WHERE THEY *cough* BELONG."  
  
"But --"  
  
"IF THEY aren't BACK WHERE THEY BELONG BY THIS TIME TOMOrrOW,   
  
I'll KNOW. I'LL KNOW *cough* and I WON'T BE HAPPY ABOUT IT, SUGAR   
  
RAY."  
  
"Oh, all right," Sugar Ray said dejectedly.   
  
"NOW *cough* LEavE. GO ON, GIT! *cough*"  
  
SHORTLY  
  
"Is he gone?" Dale wheezed.  
  
"Yes!" Foxglove leaned over and kissed Dale on the nose. "This   
  
is going to work!"  
  
"My voice hurts," he replied.  
  
"The Al does punish the wicked," Tobit agreed.  
  
"Naughty boy, pretending to be the Al," Noah said softly.  
  
Dale and Foxglove looked at the two mice, one in a little red   
  
cardigan and one in a green one. They weren't very big, and they   
  
didn't look very tough, but they did look extremely confident. 'You're   
  
mine,' that was the look in their eyes. 'I can do anything I want to   
  
you and there's not a thing you can do about it. You have no chance.   
  
You are mine.'  
  
They'd probably snuck up the side tunnel, all stealth and   
  
silence, while Dale was pretending to be Sewer Al.  
  
"You work for Sewer Al, don't you? You're Hands, right?"   
  
Foxglove asked slowly.  
  
Noah nodded.  
  
"And you're mad that we've been pretending to be Sewer Al, aren't   
  
you?" she asked.  
  
Tobit nodded.  
  
"And you're going to hurt us?"  
  
Both of them nodded.  
  
Foxglove and Dale exchanged glances. Then, as one, they leaped   
  
up out of their cranny, past the two Hands in a single bound, and   
  
scurried down the side tunnel away from the compound.  
  
"Oh, good," Tobit said. "We get to chase them... through the   
  
sewers."  
  
Noah just smiled. The Hands were at their best in the sewers.   
  
The Hands of Sewer Al lived in the sewers, were at home and at play   
  
there.  
  
HOLE IN TEN... NINE...  
  
Dale and Foxglove ran at Foxglove's top speed through the pipes.   
  
It was a veritable maze of twisty little passages, all alike: damp and   
  
stagnant and identical. They took one turn after another, hoping to   
  
evade the two incarnations of Nasty they knew were hot on their heels.   
  
Left, left, right, straight, left, right, right, straight...  
  
"Whoopsy!" Foxglove suddenly dropped out of sight.  
  
"Foxy!" Dale, trotting along on all fours, skidded to a halt and   
  
peered down. She had been running just ahead of him, and then she'd   
  
fallen right down a vertical shaft. A deep vertical shaft.  
  
"Foxy!"  
  
Nothing.  
  
Dale thought for all of half a second before jumping after her   
  
into the unknown.  
  
FIVE SECONDS LATER  
  
"Hey, great. Scratch two Sewer Al impersonators," Noah said   
  
cheerfully as they surveyed the scene. "Worked like a charm."  
  
"Was that a bat?" asked Tobit. "Bats can fly up things."  
  
"Nah, bats never come down here. It must've been a mouse in a   
  
cape." Noah smiled -- actually, he had never stopped smiling, but at   
  
that moment the smile intensified -- and the two of them returned to   
  
Under the Lions, flush with the satisfaction of a job well done.  
  
HOLE!  
  
There are many differences between bats and chipmunks. Chipmunks   
  
have sharp, gnawing teeth, while bats have the ability to echolocate.   
  
More significant in this case, though, is that bats, unlike chipmunks,   
  
have wings and can fly.  
  
Foxglove was flying back up the shaft -- she'd been more than a   
  
little discombobulated when she found herself all of the sudden falling   
  
down it, and it had taken her a moment to recover sufficiently to spread   
  
her wings and start an ascent. She was almost out when Dale fell right   
  
into her, and the two of them started falling all over again.  
  
"Dale! You didn't have to jump in after me." Foxglove smiled at   
  
him. It was sweet, really.  
  
"Hiya, Foxy," Dale said sheepishly. "Can we fly out of here?"  
  
"Well..."  
  
She spread her wings again, and gripped Dale with her feet, and   
  
tried her best to gain altitude, but nothing doing. He was still too   
  
heavy -- bats just couldn't fly around carrying a chipmunk like that.   
  
After it became clear to her this plan wasn't going to work, she   
  
deposited Dale against the side of the pipe.  
  
"You just cling here, and I'll fetch a rope, or something, and   
  
then we'll be able to go on home, okay?"  
  
"Yeah, I guess," Dale said. This whole misadventure was starting   
  
to get him down.  
  
"I'll be right back!"  
  
END OF FLASHBACK  
  
"Excuse me," Foxglove said.  
  
Linda ignored her as she continued stuffing her cheeks with   
  
Staten City dollars.  
  
"Excuse me," Foxglove repeated.  
  
"Little busy here, so to speak," Linda muttered around a mouthful   
  
of small green pieces of paper.  
  
They were standing in Sugar Ray Lizard's great hall, that wide   
  
and large building through which Lox had led Foxglove and Dale some   
  
hours before. The tongue-depressor furniture was all overturned,   
  
however, and the previously relaxed atmosphere was spoiled by the large   
  
number of small animals running around in circles, screaming and   
  
shouting. The entire compound was in a state of chaos: Sugar Ray had   
  
disseminated Sewer Al's instructions, then grabbed an Altoids boxful of   
  
gold and other shiny things, and split.  
  
"I just need a spool of twine," Foxglove said, a little   
  
petulantly.  
  
"In the storehouse." Linda had been entrusted with the job of   
  
rounding up all the finished wallets and hauling them to high ground   
  
before Sewer Al flooded the chambers. Never one to waste time carrying   
  
out orders, though, she was instead grabbing all the money she could.  
  
"Where's that?" asked Foxglove. "How does that taste, by the   
  
way?" She'd always wondered -- the SC$1 bill was almost exactly the   
  
same color as one of her favorite flavors of gnat.  
  
"It tastes dirty." Linda pointed out the door and to the left.   
  
"It's out the door and to the left, about two feet as the crow flies,   
  
so to speak." She was too distracted by her task to as much as glance   
  
at Foxglove.  
  
"Thanks, Francine," the bat said automatically, and hurried off   
  
without noticing Linda gagging. No one hassled her as she searched   
  
through the tongue-depressor-and-LEGOS-constructed building for the   
  
thickest spool of twine in the place, then rolled the spool off down a   
  
side tunnel. Butch waved at her as she left, and she waved back.  
  
  
Dale had just about given up hope of ever getting home to bed   
  
when he felt a gentle tickling on the top of his head. He looked up   
  
and the end of the twine started to tickle his nose.  
  
"This next bit is going to be very tricky," he said aloud, and   
  
walked through the process in his head.  
  
First, let go of the wall with one hand.  
  
Second, use that hand -- NOT the other hand! -- to grab the end   
  
of the string.  
  
Third, shift your weight from the hand clinging to the wall to   
  
the hand grasping the string.  
  
Fourth, let go of the wall with your other hand.  
  
Fifth, grab the string with your other hand, so that both hands   
  
are on the string.  
  
Sixth, tuck your legs up so that you're not dangling from the   
  
string but standing sideways on the side of the shaft while holding the   
  
string.  
  
Seventh, walk up the wall, being careful not to release the   
  
string and plummet to your death.  
  
Eighth, be very careful not to release the string and plummet to   
  
your death.  
  
Ninth, be very careful not to release the string and plummet to   
  
your death. This bears repeating.  
  
  
All very good in theory, but the first, fourth, and sixth steps   
  
turned out to be a lot harder than Dale had expected. Still, the   
  
alternative was to spend the rest of his life halfway down a very deep   
  
and big hole to nowhere, and he didn't want that...  
  
  
"Hiya, cutie," Dale said after an eternity of climbing.  
  
"Dale!" Foxglove embraced him yet again. Oddly, neither of them   
  
had grown tired of the experience.  
  
"Now, we can go home to bed," Dale said triumphantly.  
  
Foxglove yawned. "Hey! You're right! It must be after dawn by   
  
now!"  
  
"Past our bedtimes," Dale agreed. "Do we need to go back and   
  
check on Sugar Ray, do you think?"  
  
"Naw," Foxglove said cheerily. "I was just there and it's a real   
  
huddub --"  
  
"The word is 'hubbub,' dear --"  
  
"Hubbub of commotation and action. They're letting the kids go,   
  
too."  
  
"Well, then, this case is solved. All wrapped up, like a nice   
  
little present," Dale said smugly. "We didn't do such a bad job,   
  
either."  
  
"I think we did a wonderful job! But Dale..." Foxglove began   
  
slowly.  
  
"Yes, my little turnip?"  
  
"I've gotten so turned around, I swear it took me half an hour to   
  
find this shaft from Sugar Ray's compound. How do we get back to the   
  
surface?"  
  
Dale opened his mouth, then thought better of it and closed it   
  
again. "That's it?" he asked, incredulous.  
  
"What's it?"  
  
"At the end of a romantic comedy-adventure, like this one," Dale   
  
explained, "you have one of two things. You can have a funny quip or   
  
pun or something, that's one way. And Foxy, what you just   
  
said..."  
  
"But Dale, I wasn't trying to be funny!" Foxglove interjected,   
  
confused.  
  
"That's not the point, see. Most humor is funny, or at least   
  
funnier, when it's accidental. But that line about how we get out of   
  
here... I mean, sure it's a reversal of my thesis about us being   
  
competent, funny in that sense..."  
  
"Dale..."  
  
"But it's not really ha-ha funny, it's like a shaggy dog   
  
story..."  
  
"Dale, honey..."  
  
"What?"  
  
"You said there were two ways to end a comedy-slash-romance.   
  
Since the humor isn't working for you, let's try the other way."  
  
Which they did.  
  
  
TUNE IN NEXT TIME FOR  
DALE AND FOXGLOVE: EPISODE EIGHTEEN: PERIL AT NINETY MILLION FEET! 


End file.
